Lori Grunin/CNET
Acer’s entry-level thin and light-ish gaming laptop debuted last year everywhere but here in the US. Now the Predator Triton 300 is finally joining its big brother, the Triton 500, in North America, as announced during Acer’s Next @ Acer live event on June 23. The new version of the Triton gets an up-to-date processor, new graphics chip options and a starting price of $1,300. That’s not especially cheap for a configuration with an i5-10300H, 16GB RAM, a GeForce GTX 1650 Ti and a 256GB SSD, but it’s not far out of line, either. International prices weren’t available, but $1,300 converts to about £1,040 or AU$1,870.
The Triton 300 is nearly identical to the Triton 500 we reviewed last fall. It differs predominantly by its lower-end configuration options and the keyboard layout, which has a number pad crammed in. There’s extra space on the sides of the keyboard of the 500, so the number pad doesn’t really affect the key spacing.
It comes equipped with a 1080p 240Hz display instead of the 300Hz of its big brother, but 240Hz should be more than enough for 90% of gamers looking for rock solid, motion-blur-free visuals. There’s a mini DisplayPort connection if you’ve a yen to use G-Sync. I had a little hands-on time to toy with the top-end model, which has a GeForce RTX 2070 Max-Q but doesn’t use the new Advanced Optimus design. Its built-in display is on the integrated GPU bus.
The Turbo button is great for one-press overclocking of the GPU, though, and Turbo delivers about a 10% improvement in performance for graphics-intensive operations. You know, like a lot of gaming. It also makes it easy to drop out of GPU overclock mode when the loud fans start to grate on your nerves.
It’s not the prettiest laptop and nothing lights up except the keyboard and lid logo, but it feels like a solid model for its class. The Triton 300 will start shipping here in September, and I should have a review by then with a more definitive recommendation.